What's in a Name? (Bamon, post s6)
by chiaroscurosmuse
Summary: Bonnie Bennett and Damon Salvatore are comfortable in their friendship. So comfortable, that words are often unnecessary. But names, well, that's where Damon excels, and this time, Bonnie's not having any of it. Takes place post season 6, during an imagined lull in their constant battles against Mystic Falls baddies. One-shot.


**Author's Note: This is my FIRST fanfiction! And it's Bamon, yessss. Please be pleasant with your reviews; of course I'm excited to read any reviews. And a quick shout-out to all of you amazing Bamon writers…you are my inspiration, and I think I've read everything,** _ **everything**_ **, that you've written.** __ **Oh, and did you think that I own anything besides the story? Nope, shame on you if you did. I disclaim everything necessary, fangirls and boys.**

 _Bon-bon. BB. Bon-boozle. Bon-zai. Bonsters. Bon-ita. Bon-bina._

Damon Salvatore was bored. So he sat in the boarding house with his cut crystal glass, three fingers of bourbon glowing in a shaft of sunlight. And what did Damon Salvatore do when he was bored? Scroll through his mental rolodex of monikers, trying to come up with new and irritating ways to address his favorite witch and bestie, Bonnie Sheila Bennett.

But today was not a day of mental acuity for Damon, and he found himself lazily repeating the same names over and over again like a twisted mantra, not really caring. There were no challenges to keep him on his toes in Mystic Falls at the moment. Elena was peacefully sleeping out the next sixty or so years, and Ric had finally come to shaky terms with Josie's murder. Things had quietened down, and the rare lull had made him complacent.

 _Witchy. Glinda. Sabrina. Hecate. Tituba. Voodoo Queen._

Stefan walked into the room. Damon could tell he was having a good day; no broody wrinkled forehead action, hero hair perfectly shellacked. He had a date at eight with Caroline, so Saint Stefan _would_ be on Cloud 9. He grabbed a blood bag out of the mini freezer hidden in the bookcase, nodded at Damon, and quickly exited. It was, after all, almost seven.

 _Judgey. Judge Judy. Notorious BSB. Bon-barrister._

Damon stopped the rolodex with a sigh. He glanced at his phone, hoping to find he'd missed a message from his witch. He ran a hand through his hair, wondered what she was doing right then. He secretly hoped she was thinking about him. There was just something about her style that irked him, that made his mind wander down paths marked No Entry. Usually he would avoid those thought trains, but today he was feeling uncharacteristically sentimental. His mind drifted a bit and he contemplated the fact that even for a vampire who had waited one hundred and fifty years for a bitch like Katherine, sixty years was an awfully long time to wait for an angel like Elena. At least he could while away the time with his best friend.

 _Green-eyes. Sparky. Short-stuff. Wood nymph. Sylvan friend._

Damon could just see the irritation in her eyes and imagined with glee the migraine she would gift upon him if he kept this name-calling up. Especially if it were the wrong time of the month, or if she was busy studying her grimoires looking for a loophole in Kai's curse. But then he realized he'd much rather see her smile that crooked smile of hers as they chatted about all the things they wanted to do outside of Mystic Falls in the next sixty years. Maybe.

The front door to the boarding house opened and closed. At first, Damon thought Stefan left, but then he recognized the familiar heartbeat and step. He could hear the light rustle of her coat as she threw it on the bench in the foyer. The slap of her bare feet on the lacquered hardwood as she made her way to the library.

Without greeting, she used her magic to pull a book off one of the highest shelves. In one fluid motion, Damon grabbed another tumbler, filled it with a generous pour of the good stuff, and handed it to the witch, who barely glanced at him as she accepted it. She waited for him to sit, and then made herself comfortable on the burgundy leather sofa, head at the opposite end on a throw pillow, feet on his lap.

"Well hello to you, too, Bon-bon," he smirked, his blue eyes resting on her adorable feet. Her toes looked freshly pedicured. She looked up from her book, an antique volume of Shakespeare's collected works.

"Hmm," she replied, "I was hoping you might have the energy to give me a little foot rub?" She wiggled her mauve tipped toes and smiled hopefully. Her tired green eyes still managed to twinkle mischievously through long black lashes.

"Only if you read to me, Witchy. I haven't heard Shakespeare in a while." Damon tickled the bottoms of her feet with a long, graceful finger, eliciting a squeal and a glare. He raised his hands apologetically. She nodded and turned the page. Securing an unruly curl behind her ear, she began to read. For a moment, Damon tuned out, just observing the curve of her plump lips, the dimple in her left cheek. The way her brown skin glowed in the shaft of sunlight that had moved as if to spotlight her quiet beauty. And in true Damon form, he had the itch to touch more than her feet. Or at least somehow transfer his unexpected but not unwelcome swell of emotion beyond a simple, friendly, foot massage.

Suddenly, she stopped reading. She glanced sharply up at him, lips parted mid-verse.

"Damon-" his name came out like an exhale, a sigh of contentment-or was it more heated? His eyes travelled slowly from her toes to her face. His usual smirk was missing, and something serious clouded his gaze.

"What is it, _Judgey_?" Damon stopped circling his thumbs around the pads of her toes. He held her feet, allowing the sensation of the soft callouses, big toes angled slightly from high heels-the perfect imperfection of those appendages, to settle into his hands.

She back-tracked-was he imagining it, or did it almost feel as if she were swallowing forbidden thoughts before they could escape her mouth? "Thank you, that feels _amazing_." She smirked, her hesitation fleeting, bringing them back on track. "You don't have to _stop_ , though. Carry on," her eyes fell back to the book. He couldn't help but notice how her matter-of-fact attitude stirred some kind of feeling inside of him, and it wasn't just friendly.

"Oh, _really_?" he retorted, "what's in it for me, oh _Queen_?" He quickly added, "What would your _Highness_ enjoy now? More bourbon? An evening tea? Pancakes? Something a little more _physically satisfying_?" He waggled his eyebrows at the innuendo. She scowled.

"I could go for some chocolate cake. Wait, no, a bacon burger followed by chocolate cake. With a bourbon on the side."

"That calls for a trip to the Grille. Shall we, _Madam_?" Damon unceremoniously pushed her feet off his lap and made as if to rise from the sofa. In an instant, he found he could not move. She was immobilizing him with her powers.

"No, we shall not." She stood up, all business, arms folded across her petite frame. "Damon, you're getting on my last nerve with the snark and all the names today. You've even come up with a some new ones. Before I pop a few vessels in your brain, diminishing your capacity to make up more, I'll give you the courtesy of allowing you to explain." She released him. Strangely, Damon felt his stomach flip. Not at the threat of an aneurysm, but at her stance, her confidence and impatience. It was… _sexy_? He quickly swallowed the last of his bourbon, the fiery liquid shocking him into composure.

"Huhn. Well, _Sparky_ , I was bored today, and sometimes when I'm bored, the thought of irritating _you_ is the only thing that keeps me from going out and finding some innocent humans to drain." He folded his arms, mirroring her. For added effect, he tapped his foot in mock impatience. "Now are we going to go to the Grille or not?" He stepped closer to her, close enough that he had to look down, so that his breath made the shorter wisps of dark hair around her head quiver. He could hear the minute acceleration of her heartbeat and smell her cocoa butter-and-coconut aroma. It was more intoxicating than the bourbon. _Wait_. What was he thinking? Oh, that's right. The same thoughts he was constantly repressing about his best friend.

"Well, as much as I tolerate the nicknames on a _good_ day, today it's a little overboard. And I'm tired and cranky, perhaps even a bit hormonal. Thus, the request for a foot massage. And the need for bacon and chocolate and bourbon." She looked up at him, sighing. "And my best friend to let me read Shakespeare aloud." She glanced at the book, willing it up to the shelf where it belonged. Damon would never get tired of that, her amazing abilities. And so he reached out to her, pulling his witch into a hug. For a moment she leaned into him, allowing his own unique fragrance of sandalwood and leather to fill her nostrils and calm her frustration.

"Okay. Well, let's go. My stomach's growling." She collected herself, pushing him away. Damon dropped his arms, internally chastising himself for feeling that the embrace was too short. Well, life, human life, was too short. He only had sixty years, maybe less. Why spend that time denying the feelings he kept pushing down? Impulsively, Damon grabbed her hand, pulling her back. She awkwardly bumped into him, ear to chest. She looked up as his eyes dropped to her lips, which were slightly parted in surprise.

"Damon?"

He didn't respond with words. He gave himself permission to exist only in that moment when she was housed in the cocoon of his arms. He didn't waste any time. Before she had a chance to pull away again, he covered her soft lips with his own. She didn't retreat, she didn't protest. He could feel her heartbeat steady and calm, as if she expected the kiss to happen. Only when he disengaged did she look at him quizzically. Maybe that was also disappointment in her eyes? Sadness? It certainly wasn't happiness.

"We can't do this, Damon." She was no longer a flash-fire of emotion. She looked tired and beaten, like she had played this conversation out inside her head and knew the ending.

"Why not? I know you're thinking about Elena. _She_ wanted us to be happy. She wanted _me_ to be happy." It was his turn to flash frustrated eyes at her. He took a breath and bent down so that their eyes were on level with each other. "We _should_ be doing this. Because I don't want to be lonely-hell, I don't want _you_ to be lonely. And we can have sixty years together. Sixty years of you being _the one_."

"How can you say that, Damon?" It was defeat. Like he had found out her most hidden and embarrassing secret, laid it bare, and taunted her with it. "Clearly, you know how I feel about you, and now you're just taking advantage of my current mood to get some relief from your wait for _her_. Maybe you'll be my _one_ but she's still there in your heart. How can you have room for two people?"

"It's not like that at all." He dropped to the sofa again and stared out of the windows. The sun was disappearing rapidly, and in spite of the brief jolt of happiness he received when she admitted she had some kind of feelings for him, he felt an irrational fear that she might try to slip away after this debacle. He had to convince her somehow. "I can't say that Elena is completely out of my heart. But there is meaning in the fact that I chose you over her. That our friendship is more special than you think. That maybe friendship is the beginning of love for you and me. I want us to be together. I want us to have everything with each other. Really, doesn't it mean something to you that we've travelled light years from that moment when we put Katherine back in the cave?" She didn't respond. The sun dipped below the horizon and the windows glowed orange and pink.

"Bonnie?" Her name hung in the air like a prayer, like a plea for mercy. She finally looked at him and sighed again. But then, she took a step towards him and put her hand on his cheek. She traced his bottom lip with her thumb, ruddy against the pale skin of his face. And in that moment, the gears turning in her logical brain stopped working in favor of the bellows of her heart. This time, she kissed him, her lips replacing her thumb, her tongue gently laving the spot just below. And when she pulled away to breathe, she did not gasp for air to still a palpating heart. Instead, she looked deep into his eyes as if, with her magic, she could read his true intentions. The hint of a smile touched the corners of her mouth.

"Okay, let's go." Bonnie offered Damon her arm. He took it with a genuine grin on his lips.

Maybe instead of irritating nicknames, he'd have to come up with some terms of endearment for her now.


End file.
